Two companies have emerged as the leading online ticket sellers in India, a market that is estimated to be worth about $130 million and growing.
Launched only in 2007, KyaZoonga.com first sold tickets online to popular Bollywood movies before branching out to sporting events and, finally, concerts.
KyaZoonga’s co-founder Neetu Bhatia, who lives in New York, recently said that the company was created out of her frustration of not finding a way to easily purchase tickets online during a visit to India. With the help of her brother Akash and friend Arpita Majumdar, the three created the site.
“India may have been a bit late in waking up to online ticketing, but in terms of technology and features, we are at par or even better than most overseas Web sites,” Bhatia told Business Today.
After movie ticket sales took off, KyaZoonga quickly moved into ticket sales for other events, including India’s most popular sport cricket. It now manages online ticketing for Indian Premier League matches and the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup.
Earlier this year, the company began selling its first concert tickets to Bryan Adams‘ and Akon’s recent appearances in India. The company currently sells 250,000 tickets online per month.
Rival ticketer BookMyShow.com started in 1999, but crashed two years later when the dot-com bubble burst. Friends and co-founders Ashish Hemrajani, Parikshit Dar and Rajesh Balpande have since resurrected the site and turned business around.
BookMyShow manages sales for FIFA soccer tickets and Grand Prix racing events in India, as well as for the three-day electronic dance music festival, Sunburn Festival.
Now selling about 1 million tickets per month, BookMyShow has grown steadily since relaunching in 2007, and it counts Indian media company Network18 among its investors.
Sales for both companies are concentrated in the southern parts of India, which is more technologically advanced than the northern areas of the country. Additionally, both companies maintain a retail presence by offering tickets in shops and other stores.
